Publishers of content traditionally offered on paper have begun to digitize the content for distribution over the Internet. For example, publishers of comic strips, comic books, and graphic novels, have begun digitizing their current and classic stories into graphical image formats that can be displayed by software programs. The digitized content is then stored in a repository or on a web server and made available to users to download at their convenience. Alternatively, some digitized comic books are being offered as collections for purchase on DVD or similar format, for perusal on personal computers or through other devices capable of reading and playing DVDs. Thus, all those comic books thrown out by parents when cleaning out their garages are resurrected in digital form in much the same way that the superheroes featured in them frequently and easily return from their apparent demises.
When a comic book or similar illustrated content is digitized, each page or double page spread can be stored as a single image such as a .gif file or .tiff file. A person wishing to read the digitized comic uses a software program that can process and render such images, and reads the pages one at a time. One drawback from such an approach is that illustrated works such as comics often contain tremendous detail and color in the drawings as well as small text which may be difficult to see, much less appreciate, without dramatically enlarging the image through the software program processing the image.
One way to enlarge the image of, for example, a comic book page, is to modify the scale, zoom or similar setting in the image reader, if there is such an option, which on some display devices there is not, until a desired portion of a page is sufficiently large to allow for viewing all the interesting details. However, a reader would then need to continuously scale or zoom in and out from the page to see an entire panel of a comic book page or to read other portions or panels of the page. The reader would also be required to scroll up/down or left/right until the next portion or panel of the page is properly positioned on the reader's screen. This is made particularly difficult because the size, shape and positioning of panels on a comic book page vary from page to page, at the whim of the illustrator. The need for the reader to continuously adjust and re-adjust the software settings and scroll around the page reduces the overall enjoyment of reading the content in digitized form.
In addition, for comic books and similar works in which action is illustrated in or across a sequence of panels in particular, part of the enjoyment is being able to peruse a page in several different ways. For example, a reader may want to scan the action occurring through the page to follow the overall flow, and then return and analyze each panel in more detail, to appreciate the artistry of the illustration and reflect on the action with a more considered eye. The reader may also want to return to prior pages to recall action or details or even to scan ahead to later pages to see where the story is headed. The need to constantly re-adjust scaling settings while reading a digitized comic book significantly reduces the enjoyment of the digitized work as compared to the paper format.
Accordingly, it is desirable to provide methods and software-related tools to improve the ability of a reader to navigate through the digitized content such as comic books which are arranged in a sequence of illustrated shapes.